It was a record breaking evening as Army West Point hockey (7-16-0, 7-8-0 Atlantic Hockey America) defeated Mercyhurst (2-19-3, 2-12-2 Atlantic Hockey America) by a score of 13-1 from Tate Rink on Saturday afternoon.
The 13 goals set a new Atlantic Hockey record as the previous mark stood at 12. Army poured in seven goals in the second period alone, which matched the Atlantic Hockey record that was last accomplished in 2008.
Army outscored the Lakers 22-2 in total throughout the series to earn all six points on the weekend.
Nik Hong registered his second career hat trick to help lead the offensive onslaught, also adding two assists as ten Black Knights in total logged multi-point efforts. For the second straight game, all 12 forwards got on the scoresheet while 17 in total posted points for Army. Hong’s hat trick made him just the third Black Knight in the AHA era to record multiple hat tricks in their career.
Nils Forselius registered five assists to go along with a goal which marked the highest single-game point total from an Army skater since 1993. He is also the first skater in the country this season to record a six-point game.
Mac Gadowsky added two goals and two assists to give him a seven-point weekend as the sophomore has now tabbed 13 points in four career games against Mercyhurst.
JJ Cataldo got the start in net for Army, making 13 saves while allowing one goal in two periods of action before Jacob Biron shut out the Lakers in the third period with five saves. Biron added an assist as a puck that he poked away went directly to Hong who went the length of the ice for his third goal of the contest.
Brent Keefer scored a pair of goals while logging an assist as Hunter McCoy tallied a career-high three assists in the effort.
Mercyhurst netted the first goal of the game midway through the first period as Boris Skalos beat Cataldo from close range with his fourth of the season. Army answered with two goals within a minute beginning the 15:08 mark in the first as Forselius scored his third of the season, this one coming on the power-play, before Hong buried his first of the game off a feed from McCoy to put Army ahead 2-1 at the first intermission.
The second period began with a pair of goals from Gadowsky to begin the seven-goal frame, with the second coming on the power-play for Army’s sixth of the season on the man-advantage.
It remained 4-1 midway through the second before Army’s began to pull away beginning with Adam Marshall’s fifth of the season with assists coming from fellow plebes Dylan Wegner and Ben Ivey. Five became six with Sam Groebner scoring off a feed from Hong as Joey Baez then got in on the fun less than a minute later and suddenly Army held a 7-1 lead.
Army was not finished, as Wegner then scored his second goal in as many games to give Army eight as Keefer then tabbed his third of the year to give Army its record-seventh of the period.
With both teams changing its goaltender in the third, the positive results continued for Army as Hong deposited Army’s third power-play score of the game midway through to put the Black Knights ahead 10-1.
Three minutes later, the hat trick was secured as Hong logged his fifth point of the night on his third goal. Keefer logged the twelfth goal before Jack Ivey buried the record-breaking 13th to bring the final score to 13-1.
Army outshot the Lakers 45-19 in total while being three-for-six on the power-play while only taking one penalty of its own.
It marked Army’s second conference sweep of the season and the first to come at home.
The Black Knights will now ready for Air Force who are set to travel for a pair of games at Tate Rink this upcoming Friday and Saturday.